All-American Rejects

Vocalist/bassist Tyson Ritter and guitarist Nick Wheeler were best friends in high school in Stillwater, Oklahoma, when they founded The All-American Rejects in 2000.

And while their emo-pop band has traveled far and wide and sold millions of albums in the years since, their music retains an irrepressible energy and infectious scrappiness, two qualities that seem quintessentially teenaged in the best sense.

They’ve also always understood the lasting value of big sticky melodies, a lesson they absorbed from a wide range of early influences that included Bon Jovi and Def Leppard as well as emo forebears such as Weezer and Jimmy Eat World.